Photo Op - Berlin Landmarks

Been meaning to take a couple of photos of the bike parked in front of some famous Berlin landmarks.

Got up early on Sunday morning and beat the tourists to a couple places for a quick photo op.

 Brandenburg Gate

Berlin Victory Column

Factory Pro Shift Kit

In an effort to rid the KTM 690 gearbox of the dreaded false neutral between 5th and 6th gears, I spent $140 USD on a shift kit from Factory Pro. According to their website and many of their customers, it makes shifting the 690 feel more precise. For the most part, the 690 tranny is pretty good, but I do find you need to shift like you mean it when going from 5th to 6th gears, otherwise, you may just find a hidden neutral. We'll see if this solves that problem.

Left to right, bolts removed in clockwise order, starting with 

the bolt closest to (and slightly above) the swingarm pivot. 

Note that bolts #1, #6 and #7 are longer than the others, 

with bolt #6 being the longest of them all.

Fortunately the clutch cover gasket did not tear and I was able 

to remove it in one piece. The engine was stone cold, 

and I have very light taps with a rubber mallet.

Here is the OEM shifter detent arm 

Note the difference between the OEM and aftermarket detent arms. 

Specifically, the OEM spring is lighter (less tension) and the roller 

is just a disc riveted onto the arm. With the Factory Pro arm, the roller 

has small ceramic bearings (rolls way smoother) and t

he spring is stronger (higher tension, supposedly -- but I could not tell) 

Installation notes and observations:  Installation was pretty easy.  I did not drain the oil, or bother to do a full oil change for this... An oil change with new filters was done about 1,500 Kms ago, and I will do it again as winter approaches in the coming weeks.  I did lose about 750 mL of oil during this procedure, which I replaced with fresh Motorex 10W60.  I did use a new oil filter on the same side (the small oil filter needed to be removed in order to remove the clutch cover .... there's no way I'm going to re-use an oil filter).

Conclusion:  Does it work?  Does it do what they say it does?  Well, it definitely made an improvement -- but not huge.  I still find that shifting from 5th to 6th gear requires firm input from my boot -- more than other gears require.  I have not found the hidden neutral which previously happened on occasion, but it doesn't really feel like a night-and-day difference. Shifting generally feels like there has been a small improvement, yes but not vastly different.  I was hoping for a magic cure, one that would transform the feel of the shifting. Yes, I'm a little disappointed.  Worth $140 smackers?  Probably not.

3-day solo ride in Poland

Had 3 day weekend so I decided to explore some rural areas of Poland. Back roads, logging roads, forest trails. Tried to stay away from big highways.  Excellent trip overall.  Three full days of riding, average 300 Kms per day, about 1/2 of it was non-asphalt surfaces, with the exceptions being the main ride from Berlin to the Polish border, and back again. Most of the riding within Poland was dirt roads and grassy trails.

Paid a small fee for safe parking beside the 24/hr guard hut. 

Worth the peace of mind.

Google Maps sent me to this hotel, which has been closed for some time, 

but now under renovations. A local guy told me it hasn't been operating for a few years.  

Thanks Google.

Ended up staying at this sketchy looking place, which turned out to be fantastic.

The woman who runs the place is very friendly and helpful. 

She arranged to get me an iPhone charger after I learned that I conveniently forgot mine.

Saw this at the gas station. 

Honda NSR125 two-stroke

690 bling blinkers, horn relay, and evap-canister-ectomy

New blinkers for the rear of the 690, and fuel evap-canister removal. 

Expensive, yes at €80 for a pair (~ $100 USD)

They're made by MotoGadget

Info here

The silver tube is an integrated circuit, meant to condition the voltage 

being fed from the bike's electrical system. Not sure if it's absolutely 

necessary or not, but I left them in place.

Very tiny, but extremely powerful lights (while the LED itself is quite bright, 

they've managed some pretty amazing optical tricks with the glass lens to 

intensify/concentrate and control the light, making it incredibly bright. 

The stainless fender washer was my way of strengthening the flimsy 

plastic of the mud guard.

Look straight into the light and your eyeballs will explode. 

Holy shit, these are bright!

Horn relay installed to ensure maximum current goes straight to the 

horn and not through the horn switch on the handlebar. The Fiamm 

low tone Highway Blaster I bought at AutoZone ($15) is much louder, 

but it also draws more current.  I measured the resistance across the terminals 

of the stock horn and it was something like ~ 4 ohms.  Resistance measured 

across the Fiamm horn was ~ 1.5 ohms, which means the current draw 

is 2.7 times higher. Holding the horn button on would eventually fry the 

switch due to the increased current draw, so a relay is probably a good idea.

Here's a wiring diagram. I basically did exactly as you see here, except 

I have used just one horn. No photo, but I managed to simply remove the 

whimpy OEM and install the Fiamm horn in the same location, using the

same bracket.

This seemed like a good location for the relay. I used some stretchy 3M 

self-sealing rubberized tape (used for weatherproof outdoor wiring on 

telecom / satellite dish equipment) to protect the terminals from the elements.

I also removed the overflow fuel evaporation canister system 

(a.k.a. partial evap-canister-ectomy)

I followed the instructions at this link since Bartron from ADVRider 

was generous enough to provide full details. Easy to follow.

Variety pack of vacuum line plug/caps.

Left side of throttle body, remove the hose, install rubber cap on the brass vacuum tip.

The hose leading from the bottom of vacuum control valve was 

removed (it went to the left side of the throttle body as shown in the

 previous photo, which was plugged off). Actually, I removed the hose 

and plugged both ends (throttle body and control valve). Eventually, I will 

remove the control valve but for now, it will stay in place until I find a 

22KOhm resistor and install it across the electric terminals that feed it 

(to fool the ECU into thinking it's still connected, preventing error codes). 

Optionally, this dongle from Rottweiler would be a more elegant solution.

FOR SALE: KTM 1190 Adventure R

Selling the 1190. Since it's a Euro-spec bike, I cannot bring it back to Canada with me when my posting is finished. And while I still have 2 years before my posting will end, I already know that I won't be taking this bike on any big trips in that time, so it makes sense to sell it now while it's still worth something.

I will keep the 690, because that bike is a North American-specification motorcycle. It's more than capable for short trips lasting only a few days, and that is all I will be able to manage over the next two years.

The 1190 has been an awesome machine but if I can't travel with it, then there's no point in keeping it around. Here are the photos I used in the ad.

I cleaned it up nicely, and removed all of the upgrade goodies, having returned the bike to original condition. I've already sold the luggage racks, aluminium pannier boxes, and Akrapovic slip-on. The buyer got a package deal bargain for all of those parts @ €1,200. I should have no trouble collecting another €500 for the skid plate and Touratech seat. I hope to sell the bike for €10,500. If so, then that brings me within €300 of what I paid for the bike with the upgrades last year.